Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Here is the Donato Giancola painting for Tor's upcoming David Drake book, A World of Mirrors, due out next July. I asked Donato to tell us a little about his intentions with this painting:

"Selecting the precise moment to freeze in order to illustrate the tensions of conflict is one of the most difficult jobs in narrative illustration. Rewind the moment too far back and you’ve lost the posturing of battle. Fast forward too much and you've provided the viewer with the resolution. Ambiguity is the essence of what I am after within this context, the placement of the viewer and characters at that pivotal moment when there is no winner or loser. This unknown state allows the viewer to project their own assessment of the variables and guess at a possible future; the image engages and creates a dialog with the viewer. It also propels them to discover the ‘real’ outcome of the narrative, especially if there is an implied resolution as within the pages of a novel, for which this image actually illustrates. Want to know what happens?...I suggest you read the book."

8 comments:

The perspective on that is amazing! I actually turned my laptop screen upside-down to see it from another angle. The whole thing is vertigo inducing and wonderful. I love the color on the drakes too. I'm guessing he used patterning from real world lizards for that effect.

I will say I'm not too sure how it'll work as a cover, if it's intended to be one. It seems a bit over-full. But then, I don't much go for covers where I there's too much going on. Your milage may varry.

Donato did say that he was looking at frogs and lizards for the coloration. I didn't ask but I wonder if he took a look at the Lizards & Snakes show at the Natural History Museum. Besides color, I saw one lizard with the coolest feet! If I drew, I'd have stolen those feet for a dragon.

What a nice piece! Donato is imho one of the best illustrators out there. I had the pleasure of meeting him this summer and it was very inspirational. What makes his work so fantastic to me is his how he is influenced so heavily in Art History. And he's a nice guy which always is a plus.

Donato _is_ a great guy.I have often asked him to donate is time for various events and he is always up for it.

He once gave a slide lecture that compared the paintings that influenced him with his own work...it was an awesome lecture. Did you see that slide show? If he does it at another convention that I am at, I'd love to see it again.

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